


Wasteland

by charliewalkertexasranger



Category: Scream (Movies)
Genre: Angst, Bisexual Male Character, Blow Jobs, Blow Jobs in a Car, Canon-Typical Violence, Canonical Character Death, Character Derailment, Crack Relationships, Drama, Drug metaphors, Dysfunctional Relationships, Emotional Manipulation, Emotional Roller Coaster, Fake/Pretend Relationship, Gay, Gay Sex, Homophobic Language, Internalized Homophobia, Love Triangles, M/M, One Night Stands, Oral Sex, POV Alternating, POV Multiple, Rough Kissing, Secret Relationship, Sexual Repression, Songfic, This Is STUPID, Trevor goes from 0 to 100 so fast, i mean it's literally scream fanfic?, not smut but damn if the tags don't make it seem that way, they stuck their dicks in crazy so why not each other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-31
Updated: 2017-12-31
Packaged: 2019-02-22 13:07:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,921
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13167561
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/charliewalkertexasranger/pseuds/charliewalkertexasranger
Summary: Changing facesKnow the name, but I just can't place itSlurring phrasesTook a step, but I can't retrace it





	Wasteland

**Author's Note:**

> THIS PAIRING IS FUCKING STUPID AND I FEEL BAD
> 
> AGAINST THE CURRENT IS UNDERRATED AND EVERY PART OF THIS THAT ISN'T COMPLETE TRASH BELONGS TO THEM
> 
> ALSO I WROTE THIS IN MOSTLY ONE GO ON AN ANDROID NOTETAKING APP AFTER DRINKING 3 RED BULLS (THE OFFICIAL DRINK OF SCREAM 4) so jUMP ON FOR INSANITY BITCHES BEEP FUCKING BEEP

_Have I lost my mind_

Deep in a splash of thickets, lights flash and angry music blares endlessly into the night. It is not the first Stab-a-Thon, which had ended a year prior, and, unfortunately, though no one knows this yet, for a select group of its attendees, it will  _not_ be the last. 

 _It isn't really held in an ideal location_ , Charlie had thought earlier that evening. And it isn't, not really. It is a matter of trial and error, trial and error that won't yield proper results until the third year. But that isn't what's important to him.

Last year, he'd been very pleased with himself, to host Stab-a-Thon, to be showered in attention he wasn't yet sure was warranted, to shatter the chokingly restrictive restraints of American copyright law with only a cheap projector and a fellow dork to help him.

But this year?

He can't seem to stay focused.

It shouldn't be difficult. He's got his favorite movie series of all time, his best friend, and copious amounts of booze. If one of the three fails to amuse him, he can move on to the other, no issue. Right now, however... he can't enjoy this.

He and Robbie had taken the hint that their gathering had outgrown its past venue when about a quarter of the attendees ended up standing outside despite their best efforts to watch the movie. Even if Stab-a-Thon was just a bad excuse to get drunk, Charlie couldn't stand the idea of cheating someone out of viewing all seven  _Stab_ films back-to-back. This year, they'd found an old warehouse, marvelled at the disproportionate amount of abandoned buildings perfect for unrealistically epic teen parties, and then set up everything inside.

It was perfect, excluding the perpetual leak in the ceiling and all the old equipment lying around and taking up space.

There hadn't, however, been a good stage. When half of the fun was being noticed and getting reputations, that was a drawback. So Robbie had found the crate, smashed on one side as if someone had known ahead of time to make them a ramp, and set the projector up to display the film a few feet above it. Problem solved.

This solution rapidly changes the outcome of the night, at least for Charlie.

He remembers scrabbling his way up onto the metal, and the sound his shoes made against the rusted-out surface, and the anxiety at the thought that it wouldn't be able to hold their weight. He remembers glancing down at the decorations, the crowd, and feeling undiluted thunder coursing through his veins.

He remembers feeling alive, at least for a moment.

But there's something out there that changed that, and now, he feels as if he's dying.

Eyes sneak up his neck, his jawline, his face, until they meet his, and he spends his entire speech on-edge, heart pounding, sweat oozing down the nape of his neck, fingers trembling. A faintness creeps over him, and as Robbie explains the rules of the drinking game, Charlie shoots him a desperate glance, one that, of course, Robbie doesn't notice, given that he's probably too intoxicated to drive already, let alone notice subtle social cues.

At first, Charlie thinks someone spiked his drink, until he remembers that he hasn't had  _anything_ to drink, not so much as a sip of water, since he left to pick up Robbie. 

So what's his problem?

Those  _eyes_ are his problem.

He's rehearsed this speech more times than he can count—with Robbie, into the mirror, in his head during time that would have been better spent paying attention in class—but he has to wing his way to the end, and he can't help but feel relieved when he shuffles his way back down and navigates behind the crowd.

The eyes follow.

They aren't _following_ him, not really. He's not interesting enough to be watched. But they  _seem_ to watch him, and that is enough to leave him reeling. They're hypnotic. He has to get over there. He has no other choice. 

He knows who they belong to, and though he figures there's already a fully established mutual hatred between them, every second he spends trying to stop himself tears him apart inside.

Trevor.

Trevor Sheldon. 

_Is this paradise_

Of course, given the choice, Jill's mother would much rather keep her daughter home than allow her to go to an underage party with alcohol and fucking that openly celebrates the series of movies inspired by the death of her own aunt, and, meanwhile, Marnie's a no-show, Jenny has disappeared somewhere into the crowd, and though he's never beaten Jill, or cheated on her, or done anything to warrant it, Kirby and Olivia could have watched him adopt an entire village of war orphans and not been impressed, so Trevor is alone.

Not that he isn't comfortable that way. He's used to it by now. 

So when he spots Charlie heading toward him, head low, hands tucked in his pockets, Trevor is confused. Charlie does not like him. At best, Trevor is accepted as a side effect of being around Jill, who is already just an obstacle to seeing Kirby. Trevor knows he's probably been invited out of pure pity, or for brownie points or a gold star or something from Jill. He does not expect interaction or acknowledgment. He does not expect anything at all.

But here he is, getting something.

"Hey," Charlie says, with a stumble in his voice and a flicker of uncertainty in his eyes that scream he has no idea what else to say. 

Trevor likes to think he isn't as much of a meathead as people say he is. He knows he can come off as insensitive, or selfish, and get ahead of himself and do and say things he ends up regretting, but beyond the occasional remark, he's never one to be openly hostile or malicious without direct or indirect provocation, especially when he recognizes an attempt at friendliness. Without making any other motion toward Charlie, he nods in acknowledgment and gives a small, strangled greeting, like he already knows what Charlie is there for.

There's a nagging suspicion, of course. Charlie's face is a shade of red that alcohol cannot cover for, the shade of red taken by a timid, oblivious, passive loser spurred to action by a sudden and unexplained burst of desperate courage, and now trapped in the whirlpool of his own mistake. For a moment, they stand there, breathless, thoughtless, motionless, buried in the chanting of various lines and the brightness of the movie's light, and to an outsider, someone with no context or insight, they would be paying attention. In their own minds, however, the call of the tension is loud, overpowering, and there is no way to escape.

"Nice party you've got here," Trevor says. It's a foreign feeling, to reassure someone, and not one he's comfortable with; he's sure there's something to give it away in his voice, his expression, the way he carries himself, though he's not so sure that Charlie will notice any of that. 

There's something hot that fills the pit of his belly whenever he meets Charlie's fleeting gaze, a shade of blue so intense and striking that description could not do it justice, because he isn't even sure  _memory_  could be adequate enough. Something about it would degrade if not experienced first-hand and in the moment. Something about it wouldn't feel accurate to the exaggerated beauty.

It takes a lot to intrigue Trevor Sheldon, but that is more than enough.

When Charlie answers back, with a stiff nod like a poor, inexperienced imitation of Trevor's own and a small peep of gratitude barely intelligible enough to form words, Trevor does something that, if he were talking to anyone else, would make it clear he's interested, and takes a few unsteady steps forward, closing the space between them that once seemed like miles.

Then he remembers Jill.

He'd felt this way around her when they'd first met. It seemed that every single one of the few flaws she had, every quiet inadequacy, carried league after league of beautiful strengths that Trevor could hardly keep his mouth closed long enough to avoid complimenting. He'd pursued her for what felt to be eons, and when she finally embraced him, he had never been happier.

Who is he, to throw that all away on an impulse? 

But, as impulses tend to go, he can't stop himself. Charlie is lost, in need of help and guidance, and the urge to give it to him is too strong to battle, as terribly hasty of a decision it is. 

"I'm not bullshitting; I'm actually impressed. You and Closet Boy make a good team," he says, after a moment of hesitation.

"Oh... thanks, Trevor." There's distrust in his eyes, but his shoulders are slack, comfortable; he's opened up, unfurled like a flower bud. "...I guess, but when you compliment someone, you generally don't insult their best friend's insecurities, so I'm a little lost..."

If Trevor weren't on his third beer, and his final, in anticipation of driving home—he is a jock, _not_ an idiot—he probably would have been offended. He thinks that he hadn't meant for it to come out like that, but, in reality, he just hadn't meant for Charlie to be upset by it. He laughs.

"Yeah, oops. You're right."

But that is the low point, and even that low point makes Trevor's heart soar. For close to ten hours, Trevor helps, laughing, chatting, making various remarks about horror tropes in hopes of keeping Charlie comfortable, and for the full duration of that ten hours, there's an unspoken agreement forming between them.

When the final film comes to a close, Trevor finds himself with Charlie in the passenger's seat of his car.

_Or a darker side_

Charlie remembers well, too well, what the inside of Trevor's car smells like; as soon as he gets out, and it becomes a distant memory, he sometimes swears the bitter sweetness of Red Bull and the smooth smoky richness of weed crosses his breaths.

It isn't too long into the drive, going to a place they know will be both physical and metaphorical, depending on what they end up doing there, that Charlie, despite how he loves the feeling of Trevor's jacket over his shoulders and a warm palm that should be on the steering wheel on his knee, finally gains his second and final bout of courage, and asks about Jill.

"She doesn't need to know," Trevor says.

Charlie is too enamored to argue.

He doesn't want to break Jill's heart.

But he doesn't want to break his own, either.

_Candy coated lips_

Sometime on the way back, Charlie's restraint gives out, and Trevor's left to stare down the road as his thoughts explode. Eager fingers snake down his thigh, and to the metal of his fly, and toward the zipper, and by then, a bulge has formed against his leg, and he's sure both of them know about it. In fact, he's positive, because it ends up in Charlie's hands, stroked and palmed and rubbed from tip to base, tip to base, tip to base, before finally, neither of them can take another second of the biting torture and Charlie sucks Trevor until he's given no choice but to stop the car on the side of the road so he can shut his eyes and buck his hips in the seat. 

Even though he is a fairly uneager bisexual, spending more time projecting his own insecurity than embracing his unwanted, unasked for, and mostly repressed identity, and thinking _anything_ positive about another guy would hurt, he can't stop the musing that Charlie's better at this than Jill could ever hope to be. Maybe it's just a natural talent, or an effect of having a dick, too, and knowing what feels good, but part of Trevor suspects he's experimented, with Robbie, probably, and the jealousy spurred into existence by that single little thought terrifies him.

He's had Charlie for less than a night. He's cheated on his  _girlfriend,_ who, although they haven't gone all the way yet, things are getting serious with, with Charlie. They haven't so much as kissed.

That's it. Nothing more.

So why does he find himself so possessive, and against his own will, even? There's something magic about Charlie. Something magic about a reserved and collected geek with smooth hair and sweet features giving sloppy, rough head in a car with skill straight out of hardcore Internet porn. Something magic about the way he puts Trevor in his warm, tight mouth and fucks that cock down his hungry throat, stopping only to choke on the head when it probes too far in. Something magic about the slurping and the lapping and the rushed breaths shoved in between as if they were an afterthought. Something magic about the way Trevor finishes on his face and leaves a string of hot white cum in his hair, right along his forehead, only to have Charlie wipe it with his thumb and lick it off, full eye contact.

Like so many kids before him, Trevor left for a party and came back addicted.

His drug of choice is Charlie Walker.

_You're the sweetest kiss_

For Charlie, it is too late.

It is like a hunger, to want Trevor. When that hand had touched his knee, permission, the first move, the urge to binge had been planted, and he didn't have the willpower to resist. He had repressed himself so long that he hadn't had the slightest idea the attraction was present; giving in was like eating his first meal after being taken prisoner, or crashing on a deserted island, or having a mental breakdown and locking himself in a room without anything to eat, when he would have been left to starve so long that his body would have begun to shut down his organs and leave him without any drive for food.

But there's a flaw in that analogy, and one he can see without so much as a brief pause. To call something a hunger implies there is a fullness, a satiety.

With Trevor?

Charlie could eat until his stomach burst under the pressure and never find complete satisfaction in the gluttony.

They arrive at Trevor's house as the first streaks of color break into the sky, oranges, yellows, rose pinks flowing between the clouds, like someone took the heavens and broke them in half so their thick, vibrant juices would flow out over the world like glowing streams of lava. Car doors slam once, hard, and then again, lighter, fainter, less violent.

There is a strength in Trevor Charlie cannot help but admire. Perhaps he could match it, given the circumstances, but right now, standing in the cold, inching up to the porch with his throat and lips still sore and his chest pounding, he cannot dream of it. 

When they reach the steps, and Charlie lags back, unsure, untrusting, held in place by thoughts of Trevor forgetting his parents were home, or Jill finding out, or this all being a sick prank, Trevor is there to reassure him, placing open palms on his scrawny shoulders and easing him up onto the first step like he'd been crippled by something other than his own indecision. 

Charlie feels a rush of warmth even under the icy cloak of the strangely cold dawn, and when that warmth blooms freely in his aching chest, he allows himself a breath and continues forward, by himself, but not after considering faking further anxiety to keep Trevor's strong, solid hands on him. 

They advance to the door. Trevor lets Charlie in, and no sooner than the keys are pushed into their permanent residence in his back pocket is Trevor all over Charlie, aggressively radiating animalistic lust as lips meet lips and then flesh. As they go upstairs to Trevor's room, hands snaking lower, fingers running through hair, eyes only open at strategic intervals to avoid tripping, shedded clothes form wrinkly dollops of color against the young, pale wooden planks on the second floor. And when the final door, the final obstacle, shuts and locks, screams of pleasure shake Woodsboro.

Cradled in Trevor's arms, with his head braced on a shoulder, Charlie falls asleep, shaking.

 _But a bad trip_    

Trevor awakens first, and, judging by the alarm clock on his nightstand, a few hours before his family is set to return.

The first thing he does is glance beside him.

He didn't drink enough, in a short enough time frame, to forget, but half of him wants it to have been a wet dream, and the other half wants to cling to reality. Maybe he forgot how drunk he was, and Jill had snuck out to the party, and it had been  _her_ , not  _him_.

But worship that possibility all he does, he can't do a thing to change the sweet face and slender body beside him.

He lies there for a moment, dazed, tired, disappointed, but _satisfied_.

That doesn't destroy him.

The earlier thought, that he's helpless, doesn't destroy him, either.

It's when Charlie takes one look at him, gets up and tosses on the clothes from the night before that had been dumped against the opposite side of the door, in the hall, and leaves without a word, that part of Trevor's soul dies.

The rest wants to prove to himself that, no matter what happens, no matter the emptiness he feels when he hears the door slam, or the longing that fills the pit of his stomach when he rolls over onto the warm spot Charlie left on the sheets so he can feel it fade, he doesn't need Charlie, not now and not ever.

 _Changing_ _faces_

As soon as he's through the door of his own home, Charlie checks his phone. He left the party with  _Trevor_ ; even if no one had noticed that, he'd have at least one message asking where he'd gone off to.

Charlie's not often right when he tries to predict the outcome of social situations, but this time, he's hit a bullseye. 

_5:40am >Hey Charlie_

_5:41am >where'd u go? Audience missed u_

_5:41am >Are u okay. I_ _saw u talking to Trevor_

_6:16am >Charlie_

_6:28am >Charlie _

_6:53am >Charlie please are u ok_

_7:11am >Charlie I'm gonna give u another hour_

_7:35am >Charlie_

_7:58am >hey_

_8:05am >Charlie_

_8:12am >Charlie_

_8:16am >I really hope ur drunk somewhere_

_8:27am >hey uh_

_8:36am >Charlie???_

_8:44am >ChARLiE_

_8:48am >I hope ur just drunk man_

_8:52am >Charlie_

Oof.

_9:07am >I'm fine._

_9:07am >He kept trying to get me to leave._

_9:08am >The party, I mean._

_9:08am >It wasn't in a creepy way, though._

_9:08am >Like, I didn't think he was gonna rape me in the woods and then pull some fucking Hannibal Lecter shit or anything._

_9:08am >He was just pissed I didn't invite Jill._

It is the worst excuse he's ever made in his life, one with consequences, one that could start rumors, but he can't think of any other way to explain how long he'd spent with Trevor except to say that he was getting victimized at his own film festival.

He  _had_ invited Jill, and even told Robbie he'd done so, even if they were both sure she couldn't attend. But excuses are excuses, and if there was anything Charlie knows horror movies had taught him, it is about keeping a consistent plot, something that aids him well when he needs a web of lies to fall back on.

_9:08am >Oh my god_

_9:08am >The most dramatic webcast ever_

_9:08am >I was about to call the cops._

_9:09am >u should have just come to me man._

_9:09am >can't bother you if the world watches_

_9:09am >couGH COUGH_

_9:10am >Wait u said u sent Jill an inv_ 

Charlie sighs.

Why can't he be talking to Trevor?

Because he got scared, and he threw it all away. He had a momentary relapse of his need to repress his desires, and he let that single second of irrational judgment ruin his life.

If he weren't such a coward, if he weren't so pathetic, he could be lying in Trevor's bed right now in complete and unequaled bliss, huddled against his warmth, maybe even going in for round two.

Fuck.

Watching horror movies all the time doesn't make you brave.

_9:10am >I did. He's an idiot. lmfao_

_9:11am >I shouldn't have left you there. Sorry._

Charlie doesn't mean it. He doesn't. In many, many other situations, he would. But he can't, when rectifying his mistake means losing Trevor.

_9:11am >It's ok_

_9:11am >You left ur keys in the glove box_

_9:12am >im still taking down decorations lol_

_9:12am >i think im good to drive ur car home_

Charlie groans. Not only does he have to look after himself, he has to look after  _Robbie_ , too. He's not in the mood, not right now.

All he can think about is Trevor. 

_9:13am >Depending on how much you drank._

_9:13am >Listen, just park it at your place._

_9:14am >I'll go get it before my dad finds out._

_9:14am >If your mom asks, tell her it stalled nearby and you're being a good friend and watching it while I pick up a new part._

As soon as he can dismiss himself from Robbie _,_ he does. 

Charlie has Trevor's number completely incidentally. They were lab partners for one semester in Freshman year; the information had been saved only by procrastination, and by being too lazy to remove it from his list of contacts when he manually moved them over to his new phone.

His fingertips throb as he sends the first and last text of the morning, an echo of what he said to Robbie earlier, in a different context, a different meaning.

He hopes it'll make some difference.

_9:16am >I'm sorry._

_Know the name, but I just can't place it_

_9:16am >I'm sorry._

Fuck him.

Trevor's heart is already broken.

Though what Charlie had done, storming off in terror at the realization that he'd slept with a guy, slept with  _Trevor,_ is not evil, or even cruel, really, Trevor has more than enough reasons to call this quits. 

Jill, for one.

He'll have to move the world with his fingertips to make it up to himself for betraying her like that. What he felt with Charlie was infatuation. What he feels with Jill is love.

He sees Charlie in the hallways at school, and when he drifts into Jill's group of friends, and, sometimes, though he feels shame for it, and instantly regrets his decision as soon as he sits down, he sometimes finds himself attending Cinema Club meetings, but any fantasies are immediately quashed by the fact that Charlie ignores him and stays on the subject at hand, even refusing eye contact. 

Not that it bothers him.

His life now, when ignoring Charlie and his consequences, is nothing short of perfect. Imperfect perfection, it could be said. Flawlessness that failed at being flawless. But that is still better off than most, and certainly better off than he had been not long ago.

He sucks it up and stays quiet to Jill, and over the coming months, any regret, potential or existing, past, present, or future, is quashed. They're fucking perfect together. Every edge she has, he has a notch to fit. Every notch she has, some part of him fits perfectly into, without a single bit of either of them out of place. It's as if they are two halves of the same whole.

He wishes he saved his virginity for her.

For all his self-justified right to resent Charlie, however, long after they'd last willingly spoken to each other...

_7:48pm >You know what Charlie_

_7:48pm >It's ok._

...he finds himself hypnotized again, with all of his negative thoughts warped away and replaced with long-suppressed desires.

_7:53pm >Woah._

_7:53pm >Trevor._

_7:57pm >I thought you didn't want to see me._

_7:57pm >It's been a long time._

_7:58pm >And I'm sorry I left like I was getting chased by Michael Myers._

_7:58pm >But I was._

_7:58pm >Inside._

_7:58pm >Do you want me back?_

_7:59pm >I'm still really sorry._

Poor boy.

There's another urge, new but familiar in tone, in feel, that strikes him then, emanating right from the soft spot where his throat, his collar, and his sternum meet, and it takes every bit of restraint in his body not to answer back to Charlie that he'd love to hug him until the pain went away. 

It was his ego, of course, that had fractured them; how could he help?

And there is the matter of Jill. But no matter how much she fulfills him, numbs his agony and makes him feel like he matters, and how she is, unequivocally, doubtlessly, the one for him, he still can't hold back his compulsion to try to see Charlie again. No coincidence that it had happened in the evening that he broke, when his self-control for the day was depleted.

Everyone and their mother compares their love to magnets, but this time, Trevor thinks there's no analogy more fitting. The field of attraction, coming together, being tugged apart only to fight to come together again—it fit perfectly. At that party, they came together, and they were stuck against each other.

Magnets.

If only magnets broke apart over stupid shit.

_7:59pm >Ofc I want you back_

_7:59pm >Ive always wanted you back_

He has.

He just hasn't done a good job at showing it.

Especially to Jill.

_8:00pm >What about Jill?_

Of course Charlie would ask. He has every right to, even if Trevor can't quite find the right way to phrase his feelings. He loves Jill. He  _adores_ her. And it might just be his own misconceptions about his sexuality, that he has to be promiscuous, or betray and hurt, to feel legitimate, but he loves Charlie just as much, even if all they have is the aftermath of one night.

_8:00pm >What about her_

Smooth.

_8:03pm >You're kidding me, right?_

_8:03pm >You've been together forever. The entire school thinks you're five seconds away from a teenage pregnancy scandal._

_8:03pm >Meanwhile, we fucked. One night. A really long time ago. _

_8:04pm >Now you're back for me, and it's just... "what about her?"_

What else is Trevor supposed to say? He's numb to consequence. What else do you say when nothing feels real with that phone in your hands, when nothing feels real under the weight of the prospect of seeing someone again?

Of seeing  _Charlie_ again.

Charlie is more than a someone.

 _8:04pm >Robbie isnt the_  _"entire school"_

_8:04pm >Besides don't you want me back _

_8:05pm >I still want you ok_

_8:05pm >It sounds creepy as hell after a one night stand but I fucking adore everything about you_

_8:06pm >Give me a chance babe_

After all that, declarations of love to a guy he's been with once, and otherwise been forced to watch from the sidelines, he still feels bad about Jill.

_8:14pm >I can't stay mad at you._

_8:15pm >Tell me where to find you and when._

_8:15pm >I'll be there._

But not enough to stop.

A mere two hours later, under the cover of darkness, the way Charlie's expression brightens, going from having nothing to having everything, the way his bulging eyes fill with tears and hope and joy all at once, is enough to keep Trevor from regretting his decision, and more than enough to make a smile erupt across his face as his heart begins to lighten inside of him.

They kiss before they think, and in the back seat of Charlie's car, the kiss becomes more.

They finish before they realize what happened, and now, it's too late to turn back.

But, even in the guilty, broken aftermath, neither would change a thing.

That becomes a habit.

More than a habit.

It becomes a _game,_ one they play well enough to earn high scores. Trevor blowing Jill off to go watch movies with Charlie. Charlie telling Robbie he's sick so he can sneak off to Trevor's car and talk with him until, like that first fateful night, the first traces of dawn are present, but it is an end and not a beginning. The both of them strategically deleting any text messages that mention any particularly incriminating evidence, like names or locations.

Of course, they don't delete them all.

That's Trevor's undoing.

He can't take opening his phone and seeing all those messages right next to Jill's. He can't take the knowledge that he betrays her almost every single night, now.

He can't take that, no matter how much Charlie makes him feel like a man, he still loves Jill.  
  
So he plots to free her. It isn't fair, not to her, to have to be cheated on, and it isn't fair to him to have to cheat on her.

But he needs a reason to leave her. A  _true_ reason. A  _legitimate_ reason. 

Or half of one, at least. Trevor is not about to admit to a secret relationship with  _Charlie_ , of all people. As much as Trevor loves him, they both have to admit that, besides being a guy, he is the exact definition of uncool. Not only would Trevor absolutely demolish Charlie's friendship with Jill, hurting both of them more than he could possibly stand, but he'd destroy his own reputation in the process when Jill inevitably spread the secret that he left her for the president of the damn Cinema Club.

That's where Jenny comes in.

She is a good friend. A good person. Trevor could put money on the fact that, had she not been preoccupied at Stab-a-Thon, he would have hung out with her the entire time, since Jill wasn't around to keep him company. And if there is anyone willing to blister their hands just to dig him out of the hole he has put  _himself_ into, he's sure it's her. 

Explaining the situation takes twice the time he thought it would, despite the fact that Jenny does not ask questions or make any remarks that could slow him down, and by the end, he's sniffing back hot tears and choking on the lump in his throat that he can't quite swallow. Why did he do this to himself? It was one moment of weakness, to meet Charlie's gaze and ask if he wanted to head home. Why grant one moment the permission to dictate his life and his choices? Why grant one momentary lapse of judgement that control?

But when Jenny's hand slides over his, and she presses her other hand to his cheek, he feels solidarity, and with that solidarity, a lack of shame. 

Justifying it by saying Jill already hates her, she tells him that she'll cover for him, no questions asked, that she's willing to hurt her own reputation to blunt the impact on his. 

The best fake girlfriend a boy could ask for.

_Slurring phrases_

At first, Charlie thinks Trevor is kidding when he tells him he's left Jill for him. There was that light, fluttering tone in his voice, the kind he gets when he's about to drop the punchline to a joke, that, in immediate retrospect, Charlie realizes was an attempt at coping with the absurdity of the cruelty in it all.

When he realizes, however, that Trevor is  _not_ in fact, in the midst of a bad joke, and he really did scream from the hilltops that he'd been fucking Jenny when he hadn't so much as put his lips to hers, Charlie can't feel anything but the white-hot edge of rage, most of it directed at himself, for doing this, for being the primary cause, for giving in when he knew giving in had such terrible aftermath, but the rest directed at Trevor for lying and dragging an innocent, albeit willing, though he doesn't quite believe that, participant into his nest of deception.

Under any other circumstances, he'd have forgiven Trevor, and they'd have moved on, because, really, part of him is incredibly flattered, to the point of complete adoration.

But he has his own text messages from Jill, now.

And he relishes in them. 

She loves him in a way Trevor never could.

_Took a step, but I can't retrace it_

Jenny dies first, struck down sometime before or after Marnie, and Trevor is shattered. He does not, however, show it. Between Charlie and Jill and needing to maintain his masculine swagger, there is no room for grief that is not internal. He slaps Robbie in the back of the head for treating the killings like a movie and speculating over the murderer, but, other than that, he doesn't do or say much in response.

He knows this lack of emotion implicates him, but most of him is too self-loathing to care. Jill doesn't want him back; the closest she's come to taking him in is hissing something about him leaving her for another girl being betrayal surprisingly close to his face, for someone who supposedly hates his guts. 

And Charlie abandoned him again, after Trevor gave up everything to be with him, after saying that nothing would tear them apart again, he left.

Now Trevor focuses on protecting Jill, and everything else falls to the wayside.

He was right the first time, to label Charlie a mistake.

_You tell me, "Take this"_

His overworked shoulders throb as he gives one final longing glance at the way the layer of blood slicking Olivia's disemboweled intestines gleams under the light. But that means a moment of hesitation to groan at the pain, and in that moment, Charlie realizes that he's much more decisive than Trevor probably thinks.

He has to be, to do this.

_But I don't wanna wake up in your_

Trevor is caught off guard.

He's looking for Jill. To protect her. To further his goals. To gain back the respect and the love and the trust, trust being something especially difficult to find, now.

He's trying to fix himself.

But when he sits down to give a quick commentary on the movie playing, a break for his body and his mind from the fire erupting around him, he instead gets to watch Charlie leave. He could have assumed it was his own presence that had done it, but there's something about the glare Kirby is shooting him that digs into his heart.

"Did I just interrupt something here?"

He knows he did.

He  _knows_ it.

There's something in the air that says he did, and he wants to break down, but he can't, not when Jill is around and in danger.

When Kirby does not answer, he rises and regains his composure.

"Wow. I'm gonna be upstairs, laughing."

He turns away, satisfied with his lie and its impact. But all the lies in the world can't stop the bulge building in his throat, right in the spot that makes it impossible for him to so much as steal part of a faint, labored breath.

Half of it is jealousy.  
  
The other half is guilt.

Charlie's moved on.

And when he should have it so easy, why can't  _he_?

_Wasteland_

When Charlie opens the closet to let Trevor out, his hands brush Trevor's shoulders in just the right way to bring him to remember lying in the back seat of his car with Trevor panting beneath him, mid-climax. He remembers the sweet nothings and the fond whispers of his name, and, for a moment, he feels guilty, and he wants to beg Jill to, last-minute, pin the murders on someone else and let Trevor go, the same way he'd tried to do with Kirby.

But that would never work, and not because Jill, he knows, is a force to be reckoned with.

He must repent for his sins as a high school homewrecker, for destroying Jill's life, and watching Trevor die is the only punishment he can leave fully clean from.

_Changing faces_

Jill, and... Charlie. It had to be Jill and Charlie. The two people that, no matter how much he hurt them, no matter the pain he put them through, he loved the most.

He knows Charlie too well. It was just a few too many movies, for him, he's sure, even if he's also sure he would have been able to love that psycho until neither of them could stand the attention anymore.

But  _Jill_? She breaks him, leaves him screaming for her and swearing that, through all he'd done, through his escapades with "Jenny" and his betrayals and his futile attempts to regain her affection, he loved her.

However, it's no coincidence that every time he says her name, he glances at Charlie, and even through the tears and the agony and the overcoming terror of the entire situation, even though Charlie's forehead, hands, and most of his outfit are covered in dark red spatters of fresh blood, he can't help but go back to that first night, where they'd made love like they'd truly meant for any of those feelings to become real.

He didn't see this coming until it hit him, right in the head. 

Like a bullet.

_Slurring phrases_

The blood rushes in Charlie's ears, hot, bubbling, and seems to clot in his forehead until he can feel nothing but the pressure between his temples and the agony of the wound he knows will be fatal, his undoing. No one survives _this_. Perhaps there would have been a chance for him, had Jill been victim to a sudden change of heart, an unplanned realization that she truly loved him as more than a pawn in her sick little game of chess. She could have held the blade in to minimize his blood loss, and shot Sidney, and held his hand as they waited for the cops to come, and they could have gone with the plan as if nothing had ever happened.

He'd have forgiven her. Even now, with the breath in his body being one of the final ones he'll ever take, he knows he would forgive her for anything.

But she intended what she was doing as she did it, long before, even, and the sadistic gleam in her dark eyes tells him more than what he wants to know.

She never loved him. He was an idiot to let himself get used, and a bigger idiot to watch her treat Trevor the way she did and never believe it could have been him someday.  
  
Wait.

Trevor.  
  
Terror makes a grab for his chest and clenches down tight, like it, too, is trying to cling to life. As much as he wants a coherent thought, something other than a name,  _that_ name, or the vague, dying disappointment of a numbed betrayal, he can't seem to find one, or the strength to create one, no matter how hard he tries; every ounce of his balance is draining out of the gaping hole in his chest, leaving him scrabbling for a hold on something, anything, as his vision regresses into a collage of fading shadows. 

He catches Jill's gaze one last time from where he's fallen, slumped into a weak kneel, as if to beg her for his survival, and though he doesn't intend to, his gasps and the horror glazing his round, glossy eyes plead for him.

But after all he's done, he doesn't want to survive. He killed innocents for his own amusement, and, eventually, he'd hoped, benefit. He slaughtered his best friend while he was too drunk to fight back, just to chase a fantasy anyone capable of basic understanding would have been more than sane enough to recognize as just that—a horrific, violent, self-serving fantasy. He stabbed a girl who trusted him and left her to bleed out on the pavement, cold and alone.    
  
And he let Jill kill Trevor.

He stood there, and he let that _bitch_ shoot the love of his life.

Now, he decides that he deserves nothing but to gasp up blood and die in agony. And that, more than anything, is realistic, now. The call of death looms over his form, ringing in his ears, pooling hot and cold and heavy in his gut, sliding over his skin, and everything stings, everything burns, but nothing is as raw as the deathbed reemergence of feelings he thought he'd never need to feel again.

He can't fight this. 

Sticky fingers, paling skin, white shirt stained red, with one final rush of energy, he tips forward, and when he feels a lump beneath his head, and a body against his, he finally allows himself to sleep, the way he did the night he had realized too late was the best night of his life.

_Nothing changes_

With his head braced on Trevor's still shoulder, Charlie dies, shaking.

_In your waste-_

And when Jill tells their story,  _her_ version of their story, she makes a lucky guess without trying to, and all of their lies, all of their attempts to hide their history, are worth nothing.


End file.
